Training Your Brain

Summer is a great time for barbeques and baseball games, but it’s also a time when schools and scholars alike release their summer reading lists. Even Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, recommends reading at least five books when you’re cooling off by the pool.

And while not everyone finds the time to read no matter the season, new research shows reading and brain training is becoming ever more important to stay sharp in our fast-paced society.

Now I know what you’re thinking. I don’t have time to read. Well those of you who have young children can start reading aloud to them now. A new report from Scholastic, the educational conglomerate, suggests that reading out loud to kids throughout their elementary school years may inspire them to become frequent readers—meaning kids who read five to seven days per week for fun.

“Brain training is a hot topic,” says Michelle Davis of Learning RX, a national franchise with a location at Hamilton Place. The company has been around since 2010 but it wasn’t until the Federal Trade Commission ruling in 2016 against Lumosity, a similar “brain training” company, did the industry start to change.

“Lumosity preyed on consumers’ fears about age-related cognitive decline, suggesting their games could stave off memory loss, dementia, and even Alzheimer’s disease,” said Jessica Rich, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “But Lumosity simply did not have the science to back up its ads.”

“We as a company had to start conducting randomized control trials to back up our research,” says Davis. Just jump on the company’s website and you be inundated with a plethora of science-based research not tied to specific results.

While the company acknowledges it can’t cure disease, brain training looks to strengthens core cognitive skills the brain uses to think, learn, read, remember, reason, pay attention, and solve problems. The company says brain training has helped those clients with Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder, Dyslexia, learning disabilities, Autism, traumatic brain injuries, and both kids and adults who are having memory issues.

“We’ve helped military folks reconnect their neurological pathways and also those people who have had cancer and a stroke,” says Davis. “These are the mental processes we use every day, in every area of life.”

Each of your cognitive skills plays an important part in processing new information. That means if even one of these skills is weak, no matter what kind of information is coming your way, grasping, retaining, or using that information is impacted. In fact, most learning struggles are caused by one or more weak cognitive skills.

Targeting these deficiencies in cognitive skills is really the name of the game when it comes to brain training. These skills include sustained, selective and divided attention, long-term and working memory, logic and reasoning, auditory and visual processing and finally and processing speed. The cognitive skills assessment is the first step in developing an individualized plan for each client.

This all sounds like it’s just for kids and that adults are sort of stuck with the brain they have, which couldn’t be further from the truth.

“I remember a couple of years ago, we had a local CEO as a client who wasn’t remembering information as quickly,” says Davis. “He trained three times a week for three months.”

It all paid off for the busy executive who gained longer mental endurance, could recall information quicker, and used visualization techniques to remember small details.

“People always ask me how they can improve their cognitive skills at home,” says Davis. “Start by ditching the list.” Next time you go to the grocery store, try remembering everything you need from memory. “If you end up forgetting something, it’s no big deal.”

“Another great game you can play with just about anybody is mental tic-tac-toe,” explains Davis. “Just assign the numbers one, two and three to the top row. From there, assign the number four, five and six to the middle row. Finally, assign numbers seven, eight and nine to the bottom row.”

The game utilizes both sides of the brain by mentally visualizing the board and recalling which numbers each player uses to win.

The great part about brain training is that the brain is never too old to change. Forget about the old adage, “If you don’t use it, you lose it.” If you dedicate at least 20 minutes, three times a week to improving your cognitive function, chance are you will more richly enjoy things like reading.

“We have helped children as young as five and their grandparents as well,” says Davis. “You can practice brain training your whole life.”